Not to even compare the severity of these 2 situations but to give you hope.
One of my good friends did heavy lifting at his work and had developed
three knots that stuck out on his lower abdomen area which caused him
great pain at times. He went to the dock and he said they were hernias.
I had seen these knots several times because he had them for months but
didn't have money for surgery. He told me an incredible story about him and his wife
having an encounter with God alone at home. He told me he woke up the next morning
and all three of the knots were gone. He had them for months and then one night after
this encounter they were gone. I had to see for myself because it was hard to believe
but I saw the next day with my own eyes. It definately affected my faith.
In an attempt to understand the depression that often accompanies hospitalization, Duke University researchers assessed 1,000 hospital patients from 1987 to 1989; patients who drew on religious practices, including prayer, were found to cope far better than those who didn't.
In the most widely publicized studies of the effect of intercessory prayer, cardiologist Randolph Byrd studied 393 patients admitted to the coronary-care unit at San Francisco General Hospital. Some were prayed for by home-prayer groups, others were not. All the men and women got medical care. In this randomized, double-blind study, neither the doctors and nurses nor the patients knew who would be the object of prayer.
The results were dramatic and surprised many scientists.The men and women whose medical care was supplemented with prayer needed fewer drugs and spent less time on ventilators. They also fared better overall than their counterparts who received medical care but nothing more. The prayed-for patients were:
* Significantly less likely to require antibiotics (3 patients versus 16)
* Significantly less likely to develop pulmonary edema-a condition in which the lungs fill with fluid because the heart cannot pump properly (6 versus 18).
* Significantly less likely to require insertion of a tube into the throat to assist breathing (0 versus 12).
Not everyone that gets prayer is healed or even necessarily gets better (or we could all live forever)
but I do believe in the power of prayer and that in a way that is beyond my comprehension makes a big difference.
